Take a tour of a school that will make you want to go back to kindergarten
The Rives du Saguenay school board hopes to make a splash with its Au Millénaire project when it opens next fall.
Even the hallway floors, checkered with bursts of random colours, impress the point: this school is one of a kind.
The school not only looks original, it will also sound different.
School board administrators are promising students will be exposed to six to eight hours of Spanish or English each week — a proposal that is fuelling the enthusiasm of parents and concerns from the local teachers union.
Just how curious are Saguenéens about the project?
Au Millénaire had an open house last week, and between 1,500 and 2,000 people turned out.
Educators like Virginie Hallahan-Pilote are thrilled with the level of interest.
"They loved everything. It was big eyes and big smiles on their faces," said the principal of Notre-Dame elementary school in the nearby community of Laterrière.
Hallahan-Pilote shares parents' enthusiasm when she talks about the school's quirky features.
The school has a kitchen, a greenhouse and a general store where students will be able to sell what they grow to the public.
The tables and desks in some classrooms are made of polished slabs of wood, their rough bark edges exposed.
Murals fill entire classroom walls: one is a vivid depiction of a covered bridge; another, the streetscape of Times Square in New York City.
Plants and trees grow in the sunny classrooms.
Interactive whiteboards, Lego robots and virtual reality gear await tech-savvy little learners.
First-grader Charles-Antoine Renaud was impressed when he walked through the school.
"I liked it all. Everything was magnificent," he said.
The Au Millénaire project is part of Médéric-Gravel elementary school in Labaie, although it is housed in what used to be Georges-Vanier school, which closed eight years ago.
Until this latest transformation, the site was used for adult education courses.
Administrators say they want to create a space that seems more like a home than a school.
"We want children to think different[ly]," said Hallahan-Pilote. "To open their minds and be creative and to search for solutions in their environment."
Seeking anglophones
Au Millénaire is just eight kilometres away from Canadian Forces Base Bagotville, and the French-language school board is hoping it may attract students from military families who are also eligible for schooling in the English-language system.
One of the reasons Hallahan-Pilote participated in the open house was to ensure someone who spoke English could take questions from English-speaking parents whose children now attend Riverside Regional Elementary School in Jonquière.
Au Millénaire provides anglophone families with "a nice option, for them to go nearby," she said.
3 languages under 1 roof
Quebec's Charter of the French Language, known as Bill 101, requires all obligatory courses, such as math and physical education, to be taught in French in the French-language school system.
The Rives du Saguenay school board said it will do that, but it plans to make use of time outside the classroom to expose the children to English or Spanish.
Teachers, who will be required to speak either English or Spanish in addition to French, are expected to use their second language when addressing children in daycare, in the hallways, during readings in the library or while the children participate in special activities, such as when they work in the greenhouse or the kitchen.
Hallahan-Pilote thinks the model is unique in the province.
"All of the instruction will be in French, but every project can be in English and Spanish," she said.
"We believe that we need to adjust our schools and our teaching to the reality of the young people today with technologies and language learning."
"We have an obligation to teach them openness to the world and different cultures, so it was very easy to sell this project to everybody," she said.
Teachers union uneasy
However, the president of the Saguenay teachers union, Aline Beaudoin, is worried about the implications for her members — and uneasy about whether the plan conforms to the language charter.
Beaudoin said she will be paying close attention to the use of languages in the school, saying the Au Millénaire project is pushing the envelope.
"That is touching the very limits of the Charter of the French language," she said. "It will certainly be something to watch."
Beaudoin is also concerned about the amount of extra work teachers will need to put into developing new projects.
As well, she questions the use of precious resources.
The school board says it does not cost more to equip the Au Millénaire project than a regular classroom. However, Beaudoin says, the new desks and whiteboards are equipment that's not ending up in the schools that already exist.
She also worries that the school board will likely draw from its limited training budget to hone teachers' skills in technology and languages.
"That budget from educational services, could it have been used to help students with difficulties?" she asked.
Lucky few
The Au Millénaire project is only accepting 165 students in pre-kindergarten through to grade six.
Candidates will have to be generally successful and to show an interest in different languages and cultures. Once they make that cut, students will then be chosen at random in a lottery.
The screening system worries Beaudoin, who does not want to see the best students in the system pulled out of regular classrooms at other schools.
As for the lottery draw, that makes some parents nervous, like Marianne Paré, who has three children.
"I am definitely worried about having one chosen, and not another one. Then we would have to decide, do we keep one [in Au Millénaire] and keep the other two in an ordinary school?" she said.
The school board's general director, Chantale Cyr, sees the demand as an opportunity.
"Unfortunately, there are only 165 spaces in order to respect the prescribed ratios. It makes me want to create another one. Another place in the school board." Cyr said.
"This type of project has to be contagious."
